I fared pretty well in my 10th boards...Those nervous times of making my folks proud were done and over with. Considering what i had undergone in the past 6 months, i was firm on two turnarounds in my life, which indeed put me on a new track...One, i would never take sciences and the second being i had to get away from my mom's pinches and strict rules.
The farther land seems to have greener pastures, So was this decision to move away from this pampered and secured life under my parents. I was given umpteen options, and i ended up choosing to go to a Boarding school for my decisive years. I would say the hyped up boarding life image led me to take that step. And not just any boarding school, It was an all-boys school in the blue mountains (Nilgiris, tamilnadu). Excitement rather than fear ran through me all while. New clothes, new amenities, new rules, new friends and above all a new life. No more nagging parents, pesky friends, terrifying curfews, burdening education and what not. As unassuming as i could get, life was just about to be played by my rules, I had it the way i wanted. I see, i decide and I live, was the mantra to be followed back then.
Little did i know of this poker game of life had in store for me. Instead life was about to be lived as per the rules of Italian congregation named the Patrician Brothers.
Enter, St. Josephs Boys Hr. Secondary School also tagged St. Josephs College, to avoid confusions with St.Josephs Convent (all-girls school), a.k.a Sub Jail of Coonoor,Ooty, TN. The day i walked in, i was proud of taking this courageous decision. I was filled with excitement, dead sure of conquering this much talked and feared about 'Boarding' life!!
I meet the concerned authorities, who get a good impression of me, since they never catch a glimpse of a smiley face at the start of the school year. They wondered either i was a nut case or else i was a genuinely interested child. At the spur i would have stuck to the latter, later through the year, i would slowly transfer to the former. So i get my own bed, my study table, my own box room (where we store our clothes, goodies etc...) allocated.
So far on a recap...here is a totally oblivious teenager, who has just struck gold, patting himself away to glory for the decision taken about a new start, to a complete new zone with hopes of a better life.
A peek into what this school looked like.. 16 playgrounds out of which 5 were the sizes of a olympic football requirements. 5 basket ball courts, an indoor NBA sized court, badminton courts, squash courts, a shooting range...basically u name it and we had it...except for a conventional Nilgiris school of horse-riding and swimming pools. At the start, i could give anything to study in such a school, who had facilities matching its accolades.
If it mattered 38 acres of land, 10 pigs, 500 + chickens, 78 cows, 2 roosters and 1 bull ( we envied that the last two characters, especially when they hit the mating season,. we had 600 teenage boarders who envied this one bull for his variety-filled and commitment-less life). It didnt matter but still, it was pretty impressive for a school.
So may grandparents drop me at school, get me settled and are about to leave. I would be the only one to bid them a good bye with a heart while the rest of the wuss bags were crying their hearts out. little did i know, that soon i would join the CRY CLUB!!
the first few months go about settling in the new environment . Trying to create my own territory, trying out friends, school work and above all, time tables to match!!!
A typical school day went as such- At 6 am we have Brother Francis or Mathews pulling of blankets of us, as they realised their voice boxes and whistles wouldnt work. Later, pulling blankets duly gave way to buckets of cold water. U get half an hour to wake up, commit to your morning duties, run down to the box room(which was literally a 3 minute walk out in the cold) , change into our uniforms and run down to our study halls (a 3 minute run!!) and settle for our morning study hours. Thanks to my excitement levels, it helped me keep up to the schedules. Imagine those typical 'Gulf' butter babies, who were used to spending hours in the washroom. I had a habit of bathing in the morning which was laid to rest for 2 years. Bathing at single degree temperatures was a 'negative'. I run down the memory lane when our complaints of meagre hot water supply fell on deaf ears. We gave up on our demands and had succumbed to the Brother's rules.
The whole rush in the morning gave way to a quiet morning study session which lasted a good 1 1/2 hours. By then we would be a pack of hungry wolves ready to devour anything that was provided in the name of breakfast. On the contrary, SJC believed in breakfasts being the king of meals, and true to its title, Breakfasts were the bests. The main items varied from Baturas to shapeless idilies to torn dosas etc. On top of which we were given butter or jam spread breads annd steaming chai. Mind you, the patrician brothers never believed in limited food. But the same didnt hold for time. We had exactly an hour for breakfast of which about 15 mins took a bunch of hungry boys to say the grace. Then more time flew as we had some gossip of a femme next door (St. Joseph Convent), or in the case of nerds - bragging about solving that unsolvable problem. So we typically had half an hour to eat as much as possible.
School sessions went on from 9-3:30 with an hour for lunch which usually consisted of the typical tamil lunch of curd/lemon rice. by 3:30 we are onto pastries with that signature steaming Chai. By 4 everyone is scrambling around to make most of that 1 hour games time. As i mentioned before, there was never a shortage of games to be played, around the campus. I usually stuck to shooting and badminton, after having no luck with basket ball and its sister concern - football. As time flew, football would grow into me. But my love for the guns and raquets never died.
By 5:30 its our bath time. We used to consider hot water , our liquid gold. When one only gets hot water baths 3 times a week in a hill station, nothing could be more precious. Infact the water used to be so cold that we feared excreating and washing up after. (Now i know why the north americas stuck to rolls rather than mugs of water).
by 6 we are back to dinner. The whole drill of saying grace and catching up is repeated thus reducing our stipulated dinner time. I hated dinners at Josephs. I just could'nt wrap my head or rather tastebuds around rubber sheets of paratha and chappathi. The curries were as blant as it could get. At times we have substituted it for water. Its during this time that i developed salty dal and rice as my staple diet. By the end of which we were back to a strict 2-3 hours of study time.
Usually before bed time which happens at 10, some of us used to visit the church - which we found to be a sanctuary. by 10, lights are usually shut out and at times we used to have surprise checks by the Brothers. We rested in a dorm that could vist about 150 students comfortably. the only non-comfortable part were the washrooms. U had 120 students and 6 indian-styled toilets. If it weren't a senior and if one took too long, he could expect a bucket of water from above. It was more like a 'corner and smoke out the person' strategy. Though in our case there wasnt smoke, it was just chilly water. In other words, once inside a toilet, u not only fear of washing later, but also of the untimely and 'against the will' drench sessions. Most of the times, we get to watch a scuffle between the drencher and the drenched where the drencher is under heavy pressure and the drenched is frozen to his nuts.
As the noise settles, most of us are either flustered or have a lil more for some mischiefs, which ranged from wetting one's bed to veggies (which i initially thought was a delicasy) to horrifying acts...Usually by 11, everything settles and the noise is substituted with a variety of snores, each one bigger and better than the person sleeping next to him.
At times when i find it tough to sleep, i make a song out of these snores or use it as a lullaby to put me to sleep!
A recap of all that happened in a day, the excitement of what holds the next day and of course the in sync snores were more than enough for me to drouse.
